Last week I made a post about my different cleric builds, and this week I want to talk about macros. To start off, I decided to change my tank build to the one suggested by pkudude99 in the comments section, so far I’m really liking it. I have almost 10k hp in my tank build now, and I’m eager to test my hand at some T1 dungeons and perhaps eventually some T2. We’ll see how it goes. I have a LOT of macros in game, I think that they can make playing a lot easier and Trion gives players the tools to use them. By not taking advantage of them I think we’re under playing the potential of our characters. To make a macro in Rift you can simply type /macro, and copy and then paste the macro into the window. Or you can create them from scratch, which is something I’ve been trying my hand at. It’s very important to have the suppressmacrofailures line in there, as other wise you’ll get spammed with a lot of ‘out of range’ errors.

In my melee dps spec I have three macros, the first one is for single target encounters. The spec is built for AoE damage, so my single target dps is relatively low, around 700-800.

The second one I have is for AoE / multi target encounters. I’ve been parsing anywhere from 1.2-2.3k with this macro (remember, mixture of T1-T2 and crafted gear) as long as there are 2+ mobs.

#show strike of the maelstrom suppressmacrofailures cast rage of the north cast jolt cast glory of the chosen cast fated blow cast soul drain cast strike of the maelstrom cast even justice

My third macro is just for my two mana regen abilities, it saves hotbar space.

#show Ageless Ice suppressmacrofailures cast Purpose cast Ageless Ice

For my tank spec I have five macros, although one is not really a macro so much as just a reminder for me to switch into my gear. If you want to change your gear all at once, you’ll want to /saveequip # (where # equals whatever set you want to name it, for example /saveequip 1 for your first set). The macro I created is a simple /loadequip 1 so that my tank gear is actually on. Next I have the two usual macros, one for single target and one for AoE encounters.

It’s really important when you’re creating macros that you keep only one ability in it with no cool down, and it’s at the bottom of the list so that you’re not constantly spamming that one skill (unless it’s a skill that procs off of another skill, that’s different). For example even justice has no cool down, if none of my other abilities are up, it will cast that one (over and over until something else is up).

I also have a macro for aggro, I keep my aggro abilities both in the macro and out of the macro, the macro is meant for snap aggro when someone has pulled off of me:

I spent some time this weekend working and tweaking my heal spec, and not the 34/32 spec that I had grown so comfortable using. I played around with the macros for the 34 sentinel, 27 warden, 5 purifier build I’ve been using – and it made a HUGE difference in my comfort playing the class. To start things off I created a macro for cures that works on mouse over, so all I need to do is mouse over a name in the raid window. The first two cures have cool downs, the third one is my instant cast cure with no cool down. I’ve also kept these skills out of the macro for when the situation calls for it. I don’t want to be fumbling during battle for keys.

The next macro I use is to target myself with my mana regen spell. This will regen 15% of my mana over three seconds, combined with mana regen tonics this is incredibly handy.

#show Cascade cast @self Cascade

Some times I want spells to always be cast together when possible, so I’ve combined those heals into macros to make better use of this. For example my largest single target heal is also the heal that takes the most amount of time to cast – so in this situation (if available) I’d like my instant cast skill to be used, so that this large heal can be applied asap.

The same can be said for my orbs spell, I’d like them to do the most amount of healing possible, so I’ve got my tidal surge skill bound to them, and since they are both on a 45 second cool down it works out fantastic.

Then I’ve got an ‘oh shit’ macro, that will cast my instant cast skill, then tidal surge, and then my largest heal. So it will in essence cast my largest heal instantly, after adding an extra 56% to the heal.

Macros should be created based on your play style, adjusted and tweaked until you feel comfortable with them. If you’re not comfortable playing your character in a particular spec, then adjust and change things until you are. It’s no fun playing a class you’re not 100% at ease with and since there are SO many soul combinations in Rift this is a fairly common issue.

As always, happy gaming no matter where you find yourself! Hopefully a few clerics out there find the macros useful. You can find these and other macros on the cleric section of the Rift forums, but you may have to do a bit of digging and wading through the sludge to get to the good bits.

A little tip when pulling: *If you have conviction* — turn off MoL, then turn it back on, then pull with Rebuke (ae) or BoR (single) and hit DoA. This does damage to the mob(s) and heals you, thus giving a nice big threat opener. Keeps mobs from running past you and snapping back later on the pull.

Some argue that it’s actually good to let them past you and then use DoA after a couple of group members have taken some damage since it also heals them and gives you that much more threat, but I’m of the opinion that if a mob isn’t focused on me then I’m not doing my job right.

stargrace

@pkudude99 – Whewps, yes that’s a typo, that’ll teach me for trying to get it done so early in the morning. Will fix in the post shortly. Also, as far as the tank macros – I literally just switched to the spec you had linked in the previous post, so I haven’t had anything to test it on beside 2 T1 dungeon runs, it will take some tweaking I’m sure to get it all situated.

re: rage of the north – it’s there because I want to use it every time it’s up, and I use the macros constantly. ;) That ensures I use it without having to click a separate button. I very rarely ever run out of mana, which is why I keep those ones out of the macros, I want them up for when I NEED the mana, other wise it seems like a waste for me.

As an FYI, off-GCD skills should be placed at the bottom of a macro. If you’re spamming the macro like everyone does, then in the 1.5s of GCD they’ll fire off then but not use up a keypress “early” by going off before some other skill in the macro queue. It’s been parsed out and has been found to increase dps for those damage macros slightly. Not so much that anyone but a min/maxer would care, I’d guess, but still a consistent difference.

I gotta admit, I’m surprised you put Rage of the North in your macro — I keep that out and use it when I feel there’s a need (which is admittedly almost always every time it’s up :P ). I actually always put Ageless Ice as the top slot in the macro also and then keep Purpose out as a secondary for those rare fights where I get mana-drained. Typically using Ageless Ice in the macro keeps me at 70% or higher at all times, though.

I am also curious as to why in your ST dps macro you put “#show Crushing Blow” but then use Strike of Judgment as your spam skill? Especially since Crushing Blow does more damage than Strike of Judgment in a dps build. Typo?

I’m also impressed you’re using Massive and Crushing Blows in your tank macro. At 1st blush it makes sense given that they do more damage than the Strike of Judgment, but then MoL cuts their damage by 40% — are it still higher after the debuff? I don’t think they do, but I don’t know the numbers offhand either.

I see you still get convictions from Sovereignty and Sanction Heretic, so I’d guess you’re okay there, but fwiw, I prefer to use the Strike of Judgment to make it so I’m more or less always capped on Convictions — if the group takes some bad AE’s the ability to chain 4 DoL’s (or a DoA and 3 DoL’s) is very nice — helps the group survive and is MASSIVE threat to you, after all.

Still.. probably doesn’t matter, I’d suppose. If what you have is working, then it’s all good.

stargrace

My reasoning to both of you is this – I have 5 hot bars filled with skills / potions / clickies for adventuring and that’s WITH the macros already condensing things. You are always hitting buttons, there’s never a time you’re not hitting buttons, how is there less involvement hitting buttons in a 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 pattern over and over that you create via placement then there is hitting button 1 2 3 4 – they’re the same buttons you’re hitting, with the same timing, and the same situational thinking required. The hotkeys are in the exact order that my hotbars were in for my personal casting and you have to hit them just as many times to trigger the skills. They don’t cast for you, they don’t cast everything in the macro all at once, etc. They just group your skills together to save hotbar space.

I have that same feeling, Bhagpuss. In my normal every day life, I use Macros to make tedious, repetitive jobs less tedious and repetitive. So using them in a game just makes me start to wonder why I’m playing…

And yet at the same time, clearly Trion put them in-game to be used, so yeah, maybe you and I need to think of each macro as a kind of “Custom Spell” and the components as ‘Spell parts’ rather than complete stand-alone skills.

I was playing around with macros on my Warrior last night, mainly for PvP. It’s all very well, but I find it hard to get past the fact that by making one button cast a number of abilities I am putting myself out of business.

The fewer keys or hotkeys I have to press, the less involvement I have with the game I am paying to play, surely? I’ve dabbled with it for the Warrior because, frankly, I can’t play a warrior in PvP in the first place so I had nothing to lose. But for classes that I can play reasonably well, let’s say clerics and mages, I want to be pressing as many hotkeys as possible. That’s where the fun is.

Nevertheless, I will continue fooling around with macros. After all, I prefer systems like Everquest or Guild Wars, where you only have 8 to 10 abilities to choose from at any one time. Perhaps I can reduce the much larger number of Rift abilities to half a dozen macros and treat it like EQ. That might work.